#ocoee massacre

This lesson goes hard, so be ready. Learn about the horrors of the Ocoee Election Day Massacre (which is apparently forbidden subject matter in some Florida schools, now), with the tragedy of what happened to Julius "July" Perry: https://www.petervintonjr.com/blm/lesson113.html

The 100th Anniversary of the Ocoee, Florida Election Day Massacre

The state of Florida has recently mandated a law requiring that public schools and state institutions teach the history of the Ocoee Massacre. 

What happened in Ocoee, Florida in 1920? How do the tragic events that transpired in Orange County intersect with the broader histories of the African American freedom struggle as well as today’s efforts at historical truth and reconciliation in the age of Black Lives Matter? 

Paul Ortiz will draw from his book Emancipation Betrayed as well as more than 20 years of involvement in local history initiatives in Ocoee. 

Paul Ortiz is an American historian and professor of history at the University of Florida. He is also the Director of the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program and has published numerous works, including Jim Crow: African Americans Tell About Life in the Jim Crow South and Emancipation Betrayed. 

Ocoee massacre

In response to an attempt by African Americans to exercise their legal and democratic right to vote, at least 50 African Americans were murdered in a brutal massacre in Ocoee, Florida on Nov. 2, 1920 in what is now called the Ocoee Massacre.

Events unfolded on Election Day 1920, when Mose Norman, a black U.S. citizen, attempted to exercise his legal right to vote in Ocoee and was turned away from the polls. That evening, a mob of armed white men came to the home of his friend, July Perry, in an effort to locate Norman. Shooting ensued. Perry was captured and eventually lynched. An unknown number of African American citizens were murdered, and their homes and community were burned to the ground. Most of the black population of Ocoee fled, never to return.

The 1920 Ocoee Massacre remains the largest incident of voting-day violence in United States history

https://www.unheardvoicesmag.com

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#unheardvoicesmag #didyouknow #blackhistory #OcoeeMassacre #OcoeeFL #americanhistory #unheardvoicesmagazine #votersuppression #vote #vote2020 #election2020 #voting #votingrights #speakupbeheard #useyourvoice #blackmediamatters #blackmedia #blackownedmedia #civilrights #JulyPerry #OrangeCountyFL

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocoee_massacre

The Ocoee massacre was a white mob attack on African-American residents in northern Ocoee, Florida, which occurred on November 2, 1920, the day of the U.S. presidential election.[4] The town is in Orange County near Orlando. By most estimates, a total of 30–35 black people were killed.[1][2][3] Most African American-owned buildings and residences in northern Ocoee were burned to the ground. Other African Americans living in southern Ocoee were later killed or driven out on threat of more violence. Ocoee essentially became an all-white town. The massacre has been described as the "single bloodiest day in modern American political history".[2]

The attack was intended to prevent black citizens from voting. In Ocoee and across the state, various black organizations had been conducting voter registration drives for a year. Black people had essentially been disfranchised in Florida since the beginning of the 20th century. Mose Norman, a prosperous African-American farmer, tried to vote but was turned away twice on Election Day. Norman was among those working on the voter drive. A white mob surrounded the home of Julius "July" Perry, where Norman was thought to have taken refuge. After Perry drove away the white mob with gunshots, killing two men and wounding one who tried to break into his house, the mob called for reinforcements from Orlando and Orange County. The mob laid waste to the African-American community in northern Ocoee and eventually killed Perry. They took his body to Orlando and hanged him from a lightpost to intimidate other black people.[5] Norman escaped, never to be found. Hundreds of other African Americans fled the town, leaving behind their homes and possessions.

Leaving Weeki Wachee, Joe and I drove on a four-lane divided highway that cuts through or comes very close to some of Central Florida’s smaller towns. Our goal was to reach an entrance to Florida’s Turnpike, near Orlando, so we could head southeast and then eventually get onto I-95 southbound. As we reached the far western fringe of the Orlando area, we saw a sign for Ocoee. I had become obsessed…

Long one today. And it is not going to be an easy read, so decide now.

In the weeks leading up to the November 2, 1920 elections, the small unincorporated Florida town of Ocoee, just northwest of Orlando, saw an alarming uptick in parades of white supremacists' marches and rallies, vowing that no Black citizen would be permitted to vote. Sure enough, on November 2 many determined Black citizens did indeed turn up at polling places and were barred from entering on one flimsy Jim Crow pretext or another; and in many instances where they did enter, found their names "mysteriously" absent from registration rolls. Not everyone was so easily dissuaded, and a lawsuit was filed against the County that very day by one Mose Norman, a well-to-do orange grove owner. Norman returned from Orlando later that afternoon after having met with Judge John M. Cheney, an aspiring Senate candidate who was himself a strong advocate for Black voter registration. Judge Cheney instructed Norman to return to Ocoee and collect the names of every Black citizen who had not been permitted to vote and to also record the names of each and every poll worker who had denied them. Mose Norman did so and defiantly decreed, "We will vote, by God!"

The response from the Ku Klux Klan and their Dixiecrat apologists/fanboys was predictable and immediate: over the next two days more than 25 homes, the masonic lodge, a school, and the African Methodist Episcopal Church would be burned to the ground --some with people still inside. In total an estimated 56 Black people would be brutally murdered, and an entire Black population essentially purged, not only from the town itself but very nearly from historical memory.

One of the first people to be murdered by the mob was Julius "July" Perry, a longtime friend of Norman; another well-to-do farm owner, and a respected local labor leader and church deacon, known for aggressively speaking out on behalf of Blacks to be educated, and to stand up for themselves as full and first-class citizens. In an essay Ocoee On Fire by Jason Byrne, Perry is described as a "civil rights leader before there was a civil rights movement." Having been identified by an angry white mob as an "instigator," Norman Mose had fled to Perry's home but unfortunately the mob soon twigged to Mose's whereabouts and surrounded Perry's home. The ringleader, a former Orlando police officer named Sam Salisbury, was the first to force his way into the house. Unfortunately the specifics of the confrontation are widely conflicting, which of course muddies an honest reckoning of events even decades later. Perry's wife and children, also cornered in the house, defended themselves --in particular his daughter Coretha swung a rifle into Salisbury's stomach, which (apocryphally) then fired and prompted hails of bullets from both inside and outside the house. Two of the mob were killed as they tried to force their way into the back door, and July and Coretha were both wounded, but in the confusion Perry's family managed to escape. By then the word had gone out and additional Klan had descended on the small town in more than 50 cars, having arrived from surrounding counties and towns. The so-called "local militia," curiously populated by more outsiders than actual locals, organized a manhunt and Perry was soon arrested. Later that evening a lynch mob descended on the county jail where Perry was being held, and local sheriff Frank Gordon promptly handed over the keys to his cell.

The following morning Perry's beaten and bullet-ridden body, having allegedly been dragged through the streets by vigilantes, was found hanging from a telephone pole near the entrance to the Orlando Country Club --in easy view from the front of Judge Cheney's home. The message was clear. Perry's body was quietly interred in an unmarked grave until 2002, when a local movement finally deduced his remains' location and at last moved him to a memorial grave at Greenwood Cemetery in Orlando.

In a weirdly uncharacteristic (and frankly suspicious) reversal of the present-day imperative that is currently being pushed by Florida education officials, a law was signed by Gov. Ron DeSantis requiring that the Ocoee Election Day Massacre be taught in Florida schools. A section of State Route 438 has been renamed July Perry Highway, and historic markers have been placed and dedicated. Perhaps the most significant landmark, though, is Perry's gravesite itself --traditionally after every election, scores of voters drop by to affix their "I Voted" stickers to the headstone.